Politicians Say the Darndest Things

In the past several months, a myriad of public figures have made ridiculous (ignorant, offensive) comments about women and their bodies. We’ve put together a slideshow highlighting the most absurd quotes, following them with factchecking and some mea culpas from the foot-in-mouthers. Let us know if we’ve missed any!

In the past year, politicians have been known to speak up about women’s issues and bodies. We decided to review them:
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“You could argue that money is more important for men. I think a guy in their first job, maybe because they expect to be a breadwinner someday, may be a little more money-conscious.” –Wisconsin state Senator Glenn Grothman

The truth is, according to a 2012 study by Prudential Financial, more than half of American women are breadwinners.
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In a conversation with Mark Scolforo from The Associated Press and Tom Smith, Senate candidate:

MS: How would you tell a daughter or granddaughter who, God forbid, would be the victim of a rape, to keep the child against her own will? Do you have a way to explain that?

TS: I lived through something similar to that in my own family. She chose life, and I commend her for that. She knew my views. But, fortunately for me, I didn’t have to… she chose the way I thought. No, don’t get me wrong, it wasn’t rape.

A spokesperson for Tom Smith said after his statement that while his answers “may have been less artful,” he did not mean to draw the comparison between having a pregnancy out of wedlock and rape.
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“I do have concerns about women in front-line combat, I think that could be a very compromising situation, where people naturally may do things that may not be in the interest of the mission, because of other types of emotions that are involved.” –Rick Santorum on women serving in the military

Santorum made a statement saying that he meant men’s emotions, not the women’s in his previous quote. He clarified it by saying that “men have emotions when you see a woman in harm’s way.”
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“What does it say about the college co-ed Susan Fluke [sic], who goes before a congressional committee and says that she must be paid to have sex. What does that make her? It makes her a slut, right? It makes her a prostitute. She wants to be paid to have sex. She’s having so much sex she can’t afford the contraception.” –Rush Limbaugh on Sandra Fluke

Limbaugh later issues an apology to Fluke on his website for his “insulting word choices” after many national companies pulled their sponsorship from his show.
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“If you really – there are very few pregnancies as a result of rape, fortunately, and incest – compared to the usual abortion, what is the percentage of abortions for rape? It is tiny. It is a tiny, tiny percentage… Most abortions, most abortions are for what purpose? They just don’t want to have a baby! The second reason for abortion is you’d like a boy and it’s a girl, or vice versa. And I know a lot of people are opposed to abortion who are pro-choice.” –Maryland Representative Roscoe Bartlett

The truth is, roughly 207,000 women are raped each year, which means that 15.5 percent of all rape and sexual assault victims become pregnant. Sex-selective abortions are far more rare.

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“First of all, from what I understand from doctors, [pregnancy from rape] is really rare… If it’s a legitimate rape, the female body has ways to try to shut that whole thing down. But let’s assume that maybe that didn’t work or something. I think there should be some punishment, but the punishment ought to be on the rapist and not attacking the child.” –Missouri Representative Todd Akin

The truth is, an estimated 32,000 pregnancies result from rape per year.

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The FBI changed the definition of rape in 2012 to “The penetration, no matter how slight, of the vagina or anus with any body part or object, or oral penetration by a sex organ of another person, without the consent of the victim.”

Is that legitimate enough?

As Eve Ensler said in her letter to Todd Akin:

“I am asking you… to get out of my body, out of my vagina, my womb, to get out of all of our bodies. These are not your decisions to make. These are not your words to define.”